Gulf Coast school districts shut doors ahead of storm

Area school districts shut doorsMost planning to reopen Monday after storm passes

Published 5:30 am, Friday, September 12, 2008

Hundreds of schools across the Gulf Coast — including those in Houston, Conroe, Katy, Cypress-Fairbanks and Fort Bend — closed today to give families and district employees time to prepare for Hurricane Ike.

As the storm approaches, workers were busy boarding up windows, backing up student records, unplugging computers and moving buses to higher ground.

Some districts have taken on extra duties, including lending buses to government evacuation efforts. The Galena Park ISD football stadium, for example, is being used as a base by the U.S. Coast Guard, which has parked two 25-foot search-and-rescue boats under the visitors' stands.

"Having their forward operating base so close to areas that may suffer extreme damage from Hurricane Ike will allow the men and women of the Coast Guard to provide much-needed help that much faster," Galena Park ISD spokesman Craig Eichhorn said.

If possible, Houston-area school officials will start assessing damages 10 to 12 hours after Ike makes landfall. If a campus is deemed unfit to reopen, districts will turn to emergency plans for possible temporary locations, Boland said.

Officials hope to reopen most schools on Monday, he said. Even if the area sustains some damage, Boland said schools won't delay reopening any longer than they have to.

"It's important for little children to keep life as routine as you can," Boland said.

A few districts, including La Porte and the KIPP charter school system, announced Thursday that they don't plan to reopen until Tuesday.

KIPP co-founder Mike Feinberg said if Houston emerges unscathed, he'll be thrilled to readjust his plans.

"Given the decent chance of power outages and flooding, we are calling no school now and will do a phone chain to tell people we are having school on Monday, if we can," he said. "It's easier to find people to give them good news if all utilities and systems are all working than finding people in a mess."

HISD officials said they plan to send hundreds of workers out Sunday to assess damage. They'll check to see whether the district's 300-plus campuses have lost electricity or sustained other damage.

"A lot of schools actually sit up pretty high, and we don't have any basements. Hopefully, we won't have any flooding," said Brad Bailey, general manager of benefits and risk management.

Texas Education Agency officials said they have representatives in the Department of Public Safety bunker in Austin monitoring the storm and coordinating buses for evacuation efforts. They're prepared to help any district in need after the Ike passes.

"With Katrina and Rita, our work really began afterwards with the movement of students," TEA spokeswoman DeEtta Culbertson said.

In other parts of the state, schools were being opened as shelters for Gulf Coast residents. Middle and high school gymnasiums in Travis, Williamson and Hays counties in the Austin area, for instance, were set to serve as shelters.